One of our roving culture vulture reporters, Charles Dickens, reluctantly tore himself away from a CBD patisserie where he usually lolls about reading Le Monde , noisily sipping latte and nibbling truffle impregnated Anzac biscuits, to try and gauge the disposition of Darwin rural area peasants who labour in the gamba grass infested fields.
From conversations with dyspeptic members of the CBD bourgeoisie , especially the Smith Street Mall and Cavenagh Street shopkeepers, our dilettante scribe had formed the firm opinion that there is immense unrest among the citizenry, verging on revolt .
Smith Street Mall shopkeepers want to tar and feather the Darwin City Council over the loss of business they blame on the refurbishment project. The Cavenagh business people, says Chas, are furious with the Darwin City Council’s proposed plan to turn the street into a tree-lined imitation Champs Elysee , wiping out 100 parking places in the process , as well as guillotining the financial well being of a considerable number of businesses.
From these soundings, he is convinced that if Danny the Red rocked into Darwin in a battered Citroen with a pack of long-haired, unwashed backpackers and defiantly declared that they would not pay Council fines for parking overnight at East Point there would be a massive uprising against all authority, equal in ferocity to the storming of the Bastille .
Our reporter says the Cavenagh Street burghers are so angry he has not heard such abusive language uttered since he was ejected by Inspector Clouseau from an Alliance Francaise party one July 14th after drinking too much free champagne/absinthe/ cognac , loudly braying that real men don’t eat croissants, and draping the tricolour about him like a berka.
Donning a Panama, much loved by members of the legal fraternity and bowtie wearing members of the literati , our man hired a charabanc and ventured out to the darkest depths of Darwin’s rural area to gauge the pulse of the rustics.
From past experience , he knew what to expect : wild stories about the Labor government in Canberra going to treble the GST; Pauline Hanson is the reincarnation of Mother Mary MacKillop; the emperor has no clothes; a well known Federal politician had a different name when he worked in the Territory and a Russian man ( or was it the Captain of a UFO?) pretended to be the father of a widowed Latvian woman to scare off the pollie who had amorous intentions ; the *#/*!United Nations in the Yew Nited States is plotting to take over the world, etcetera, etcetera.
As our intrepid observer travelled about the backblocks, deep in our equivalent of the Bois de Bologne ,the green sward running between Howard Springs and Humpty Doo , he detected evidence of civil animosity towards the bewigged establishment.
Several signs warning the NT Government not to rezone the land caught his eye. One read GREEN BEFORE GREED . Clearly, this is not the motivating force of Wall Street. Another plugged for no clear felling of trees. Henderson was instructed to back off . Australian flags fluttered on several properties and boxing kangaroos stood guard , ready to pounce on any surveyor or person with a chainsaw and kick the bejezus out of them . A missing young dingo was the subject of another sign.
FOOTNOTE: After experiencing all the pent up anger throughout the Top End , Dickens suggests those able to take advantage of the rising Aussie dollar should flee across the English Channel to France before the tumbrils begin rolling along the Stuart Highway .
From conversations with dyspeptic members of the CBD bourgeoisie , especially the Smith Street Mall and Cavenagh Street shopkeepers, our dilettante scribe had formed the firm opinion that there is immense unrest among the citizenry, verging on revolt .
Smith Street Mall shopkeepers want to tar and feather the Darwin City Council over the loss of business they blame on the refurbishment project. The Cavenagh business people, says Chas, are furious with the Darwin City Council’s proposed plan to turn the street into a tree-lined imitation Champs Elysee , wiping out 100 parking places in the process , as well as guillotining the financial well being of a considerable number of businesses.
From these soundings, he is convinced that if Danny the Red rocked into Darwin in a battered Citroen with a pack of long-haired, unwashed backpackers and defiantly declared that they would not pay Council fines for parking overnight at East Point there would be a massive uprising against all authority, equal in ferocity to the storming of the Bastille .
Our reporter says the Cavenagh Street burghers are so angry he has not heard such abusive language uttered since he was ejected by Inspector Clouseau from an Alliance Francaise party one July 14th after drinking too much free champagne/absinthe/ cognac , loudly braying that real men don’t eat croissants, and draping the tricolour about him like a berka.
Donning a Panama, much loved by members of the legal fraternity and bowtie wearing members of the literati , our man hired a charabanc and ventured out to the darkest depths of Darwin’s rural area to gauge the pulse of the rustics.
From past experience , he knew what to expect : wild stories about the Labor government in Canberra going to treble the GST; Pauline Hanson is the reincarnation of Mother Mary MacKillop; the emperor has no clothes; a well known Federal politician had a different name when he worked in the Territory and a Russian man ( or was it the Captain of a UFO?) pretended to be the father of a widowed Latvian woman to scare off the pollie who had amorous intentions ; the *#/*!United Nations in the Yew Nited States is plotting to take over the world, etcetera, etcetera.
As our intrepid observer travelled about the backblocks, deep in our equivalent of the Bois de Bologne ,the green sward running between Howard Springs and Humpty Doo , he detected evidence of civil animosity towards the bewigged establishment.
Several signs warning the NT Government not to rezone the land caught his eye. One read GREEN BEFORE GREED . Clearly, this is not the motivating force of Wall Street. Another plugged for no clear felling of trees. Henderson was instructed to back off . Australian flags fluttered on several properties and boxing kangaroos stood guard , ready to pounce on any surveyor or person with a chainsaw and kick the bejezus out of them . A missing young dingo was the subject of another sign.
FOOTNOTE: After experiencing all the pent up anger throughout the Top End , Dickens suggests those able to take advantage of the rising Aussie dollar should flee across the English Channel to France before the tumbrils begin rolling along the Stuart Highway .
